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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » YouGov finds 66 PC backing Osborne’s budget but LAB’s 5pc lead remains
As can be seen from the Times front page the first Budget polling by YouGov finds strong support from voters for the measures in Wednesday’s statement.
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09:57 6 10.00 6 20-Mar-14 17:43
65+ Kippers small swingback to CON.
I’d call that a success.
Mark Senior published two overnight results on the last thread. One Con GAIN and one Con HOLD. Presumably the other results are counting this morning.
Quite correct. We need to see a string of polls over the coming few weeks to determine whether the budget has moved the numbers. In particular ICM would be useful, we are far too reliant on YouGov because on their continuous output.
Quality not quantity is to be favoured or if you're Eric Pickles both with an added dash of excess.
As you say “normally”. It’s a bit early for effects, and there are all sorts of local issues, but they are actual voters putting their actual crosses.
Danny Alexander also almost gave the game away with his comments on R5 on the day of the budget. Asked what there was in the budget for those oppressed hard working people (and the lazy sods who spend half their day on blog sites like this one of course) he replied that the biggest single measure in the budget was the £500 increase in the basic allowance for 25m people.
Putting aside how many of those 25m were already not paying taxes this means that the biggest measure cost 25m x£100 (at 20%) = £2.5bn. Not chicken feed but pretty close for a government spending £730+bn a year.
In short the budget was as I and others predicted, a steady as she goes budget but with a very clever piece of marketing fluff added on to hide the fact. Almost a classic squirrel in fact. But for the pension reforms I am sure the question would have been is that it?
An ungrateful electorate continues to ask what is in this recovery for me. The answer, unfortunately, remains not much. Until our productivity improves real wages will not grow significantly. Increasing productivity and at the same time finding lots of new jobs for the low skilled is tricky. It will take a lot of investment and a lot of time. This year real wages will start to increase again but for most not by enough to buy that game of bingo. The tories will not win on the basis of past performance. They need to win the argument that their future performance will be better than the alternative. Balls and Miliband are doing their best but this is not an easy sell.
The St. Albans man was shot in the neck by the Taleban during a fire fight but continued leading his squad for ninety minutes before being relieved.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-26667333
some of us at the coal face think the market has it wrong...
From the FT today:
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/a6ea8d26-b048-11e3-8efc-00144feab7de.html#ixzz2wa30eRCJ
Ned Cazalet, an independent consultant to the insurance industry, said the stock market reaction to the announcement – close to £3bn was wiped off the value of insurance company shares – was wildly off the mark.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/scotland/10712784/Alex-Salmond-refuses-to-disclose-luxury-hotel-costs-over-security-fears.html
Guess how many want to stop seeking those now?
Clue = goose eggs.
They can only counter that by getting 40%ish themselves, and they don't seem to have a strategy for that. I'm not sure there is one, but concentrating their pre-election budget on changes to the arrangements when you retire and adding 1p off beer probably isn't it.
These are not overnight fixes but they are steps in the right direction. Our balance of payments remains dreadful and shows a country that continues to live well beyond it's means.
Personally I find the idea of someone with the economic understanding of markets demonstrated by Miliband and, to a lesser extent, Balls in recent times trying to address these very difficult underlying problems quite scary. Miliband has no economic vision at all. That is why he was caught out in his reply.
We are in a period of cold-turkey. Needless to say there has been a credit withdrawal overshoot (ask SME owners) but we should revert to the mean before too long as banks are assured a growing economy will allow them to rebuild their balance sheets, barring any black swan/Russian events.
It is the extension of credit which will contribute to the broad feeling of recovery but that is not to say that I am in favour of a return to the profligate times. Far from it, more a pullback from where we are now in terms of availability of credit.
People are working harder. Their pay has declined in relative terms, and the pound buys less than it used to thanks to high inflation on essentials and a policy of devaluation. Its a "voteless" recovery because for millions of people there isn't a recovery. I go back to the supermarkets supplying the masses - the big boys all say their shoppers have less to spend, the discounters and mopping up. Less money in your pocket does not equal recovery no matter what the official stats say.
The key issue will be, in the polling booth, does the electorate *really* trust Labour not to c*ck it up again.
The biggest negative in our balance of payments is energy imports. From a national financial strategic perspective we should really push to maximise UK energy output. That means incentivising North Sea investment. But most of all it means fracking.
If we can produce significant volumes of shale gas there may or may not be some downward pressure on gas bills. (Nice to have but not the main driver). There will be some good job creation in the north west. (Nice to have but not the main driver). BUT..we will produce our own gas and stop having to import it. This is massive. And it's taxable. The impact on our national finances (fiscal deficit, trade deficit) would be huge and positive.
Any government of left or right should legislate to overcome nimbyism and get fracking.
I said as much on Weds that I didn't expect the Labour figures to shift by much as a direct consequence of the budget. Rather a shift back from the older kippers, and a firming up of the Lib Dem share.
Been a good day for me so far, won on a radio quiz this morning and the roads were very quiet on the way to work.. Sun is out and no sign of rain, so my lunchtime run today should be ok too.
"This week, the Chancellor, George Osborne, unveiled another fuel duty freeze in his annual Budget." - cheers George.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-26669614
I also agree with alanbrooke that import substitution should not be overlooked. We continue to make progress on the supply chain for car manufacturing and to some extent pharma but we need much, much more to make us better off as a nation.
Mr. Easterross, there is a lot of bouncing around with YouGov's numbers. I wonder if this is to be expected, given the frequency and volume of polls produced. On the other hand, a psych test aims to have at least a 0.95 p value, meaning that there's a 95% chance (minimum) that the results are due to accurately measuring whatever issue(s) are sought rather than random chance. By that measure 1 out of 20 (or fewer) test results would be due to random factors and 19 out of 20 (or more) would be because of the test accurately measuring what it sets out to measure.
If opinion polls were the same, that'd mean we'd only get something even like a rogue once every three to four weeks or so. On the other hand, psych tests can be more involved, time-consuming and should have double-back questions (so, you might ask "Do you agree Ed Miliband is crap?" and, later "Do you agree Ed Miliband is super?").
We need a good mix of generation including renewables, nuclear, and carbon to ensure the lights don't go out.
Many would have wanted more tax relief etc, but GO had very little to play with.
Re: VI. The public sector know that there is a more fat to be removed and also that more services will be moved away from LA financial and political control. So probably they are looking to Labour for their salvation.
Not a great sign.
"That'll show them" would be one easy to understand motive.
Different from GE2015 when more dispassionate assessment is required.
Agree with you about the traditional left and the state; Labour went horribly wrong on that front when it was in power. But I do not buy into the private sector good/public sector bad mantra that so many Tories on here and more generally seem to espouse. The state has achieved extraordinary things in this country and tens of millions have benefited. It also seems to work pretty well in many other countries. It's something that's worth sticking with and trying to get right, not abandoning.
Interesting to hear your views on the parties. My take is that the state should only be involved in matters of national significance and having a very narrow definition of that. The easy ones are defence, health (in the UK's method of provision), economy (taxation etc). After this are the other main areas where I see the state having a major role, infra-structure development, long term demographic planning, limited social safety net.
All else should be left to the individual and the role of government would be to allow that to happen.
"Heroin abuse in the US has been spreading beyond inner cities, resulting in a sharp rise in addiction and death. Chicago is a hub for cheap, pure and plentiful heroin, much of it supplied by Mexican drug cartels.
Chicago's "L" train green line leads directly to the open-air drug markets on the city's west side.
As we travel the route with one of the addicts, Jason, he phones his contact. He wants two bags of heroin, each costing just $10 (£6). The dealer meets us, and within seconds two tiny bags are handed over.
This part of Chicago has been ground down by neglect, drugs and crime, and residents talk openly about the narcotics on sale."
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-26672422
That's not the only consideration, of course. We need provision for vital public services, but they must be paid for.
Incidentally, it seems the pensions changes won't be permitted for public sector defined benefit pensions (ie they can't shift to defined contribution and take a big lump sum) on the basis the Treasury would rather pay a little each year than a large one-off sum.
I do realise that my posts saying nothing much is happening and Labour is stably 5% ahead must look at best complacent and at worst smug, and I try not to do it every day. But it needs to be said, not least on a betting site, as there is a very strong PB tendency to overreact to things that most people barely notice.
I think there are two potential game-changers - the perception of the Euro result in terms of what it does to the kipper vote, and the Indyref. Otherwise, we should be OK.
Labour's gobsmacked response to the pension reforms means the conservatives are quite at liberty to run all sorts of scare stories about labour pension plans.
I was referring mainly to OGH's previous thread that showed public sector employees preferring Labour by a large margin.
"Too many tweets might make a..." - as he wisely predicted.
On a serious note, a country with aspirations of joining the EU seems to be sliding ever more towards an oppressive state.
If the Conservatives hold their nerve, they will probably overtake Labour in the polls this year. That's quite a big if though.
This one can be measured by metrics. There is an element of feedback loop, I grant you.
For those wondering, if you backed Rosberg I'd probably advise hedging now if you haven't already (he was 17 and 24 or so with Ladbrokes and Betfair respectively, and is now about 4). Magnussen was 51 and is now around 24 (I'm leaving that for the time being. The McLaren may be more reliable than the Mercedes, and, although slower, is very close to the Red Bull and better than probably all others save perhaps Williams).
O/T - a report on the student fees situation and public spending.
Leave some fight for the ring.
And please no policies until the autumn.
Either way, privatised or public, the state (well, taxpayers) pay for it. Taking my job as an example, I guess it comes down to whether you think a company like G4S or AssetCo can deliver the service required at a price that enriches their shareholders, at least as well as it's done by the public sector.
I'd argue that they can't, but I guess we could go back and forth on that all day.
Yes lead soon ?
LOL
The shorter the period of scrutiny the better, right?
Reveal at the last minute and you lose the chance to quietly kill off the duds and you can't build a narrative round the good stuff.